Hell is Empty
by Drogna
Summary: How did Rip end up baking cakes during his long imprisonment on the Waverider? Well, it was the only way Gideon knew to keep him sane. This is the story of how a very lonely Rip Hunter comes to perfect his fondant bows, whilst Eobard Thawne finds new ways to make his life hell. Spoilers for Doomworld.
1. Chapter 1

AN: I don't own Legends of Tomorrow and make no money from writing this.

AN2: Legends loves to torture Rip and then gloss over the details. I like to torture Rip and explain all the details. That's sort of how this fic came to be, because I had details of what Thawne could have done that were considerably worse than just leaving Rip alone with only Gideon and his cakes for company. Not that being all alone on the Waverider for over a year isn't bad enough, but Thawne is a bad guy and he's always going to up his game if he can.

Depending on what happens in the S2 finale, I may write a chapter 2 of what happens when the team gets back together.

AN3: Apparently one of the details in this is wrong, because I've now read that Rip doesn't know that he's tiny. Oh well, I guess this is AU.

* * *

"Hell is empty and all the devils are here." - William Shakespeare

* * *

When Rip awoke on the Waverider he knew that the worst had happened. He didn't remember what knocked him out, but he did remember that the last words he'd heard were Nate saying that he didn't think the Legion knew how to use the Spear of Destiny. This seemed to prove that wrong.

He was on his own on the bridge. The rest of the team weren't where they had been before he'd lost consciousness. He had very little time to ponder their fate though.

The ship shook. It was a strange motion. It didn't feel like any kind of time quake or that they were being shot at. If anything, it reminded him of the time that the Waverider had been grabbed by Savage's Leviathan. Rip grabbed hold of the edge of the console, and hung on for dear life. The console itself was dead and there didn't appear to be any power getting to it at all. The lights were working and life support seemed to be too, but that was about it. He moved forwards to check the pilot's console and found that dead too.

A menacing laugh reverberated around the ship. Weirdly loud and deep. Rip looked up to see the giant visage of Eobard Thawne's face. He couldn't help but take several steps back in surprise.

"I see you're awake," boomed the giant speedster.

"Eobard," snarled Rip, with undisguised animosity. "What have you done?"

"Cut you down to size," replied Thawne. "You're going to make a nice desk ornament."

"You used the Spear to turn yourself into a giant?" asked Rip, somewhat baffled by what he was seeing.

There was that laughter again. Rip would quite happily have slammed his fist into Thawne's face to stop it, but in his current predicament there was no way to reach Thawne.

"No, my dear Captain, I turned you into a toy. A toy where you will live out the rest of your days, alone. I've left you working life support and enough to fabricate some food and drink, but I'm afraid you won't be jumping anywhere or flying ever again."

Rip slammed his hand into the back of the chair he was nearest to. "What have you done with my crew, you monster!" His anger was getting the better of him.

"I'd worry about your own situation, Captain Hunter," said Eobard.

He felt the Waverider move again and now it was being set down on what looked like a desk. He couldn't really see much at all of where he was. Luckily Eobard seemed to have finished bumping him about for now. Rip slumped down in the pilot's chair. He found himself in awe of the power of the Spear of Destiny, and his mind was having trouble processing exactly what had been done. And where were his crew? What horrible punishments had Eobard and the Legion thought up for them? He lost track of time while he contemplated what could have happened and how.

This was not good, but there had to be a way of getting out of it. If he could get to the Spear then he could set this all right again. Yes, his ship was currently non-operational, but no one knew the Waverider like he did. First things first, he needed to conduct a complete assessment of exactly what he had to work with and that meant a complete inspection of the Waverider. That would probably take several hours, but it seemed he had time.

He went to the parlour, grabbed the paper copies of the ship's schematics that he kept for emergencies such as this and set to work. He started with the engines, but found them to be totally inoperable. The time drive also had no power and life support appeared to be operating on power from the solar array. The solar array wasn't even working at full power, which explained why he was basically running emergency systems only. He could probably survive on the Waverider like this for many years, but it would only be survival, nothing more.

Even the hatches seemed to be sealed, so he was well and truly trapped until he could work out how to power the ship back up again. This was something that he'd expected but it was somewhat disheartening all the same.

He sat down heavily on the floor in the silent engine room, his shirtsleeves rolled up to his elbows and covered in dirty marks and grease stains. He couldn't find anything actually wrong with the Waverider, it just had no power. He'd need to find an external power source to give the drive a kick and then he'd be able to get the engines started again. But he couldn't do that without being able to leave the Waverider, the solar array wouldn't provide enough power given current conditions, and he was basically imprisoned in his own ship.

So far his current investigations had taken most of a day. He was tired and hungry, perhaps it was time to eat and get some sleep. The light appeared to be dimming outside the ship which suggested that night was approaching. He decided to give up for the day and resume his efforts tomorrow. He did his best to clean off the worst of the grime from his hands and pulled his jacket back on. He headed for the galley and fabricated a nutritious meal. He was going to need all his strength and brain power if he was going to get out of this. He ate in silence, feeling the lack of his team and their ever-present noise.

The Waverider usually hummed with life, not just from the noises of its crew but from the vibrations of the engines through the floor and walls. Now, everything was quiet and the lack of noise was becoming oppressive. He was going to need to do something about that. Perhaps his next task should be to bring Gideon online and then at least he'd have someone to talk to. Someone to bounce ideas off, he reasoned with more enthusiasm, because he definitely wasn't lonely. Captain Rip Hunter did not get lonely, especially after only one day without his crew. He'd been on his own for years before the Legends joined him.

He toyed with the rest of his meal and didn't much more of eat it. Then he made his way to his quarters, put on his pyjamas and did his best to sleep. He managed a few hours, but couldn't bear to lie in bed longer whilst he had work to do. He showered and dressed. He didn't bother with his coat or a jacket, deciding that a shirt and trousers would be sufficient for working on the electrical systems.

He spent the next few hours going over power calculations to see if he actually had enough power to even bring Gideon online. If he powered down some of the less essential systems then it was a possibility. Gideon might be able to do a better job of rebalancing the power once she was up and running. She would have to be in voice only mode because there definitely wasn't enough power for her hologram form.

He made the necessary adjustments manually, which basically meant actually physically uncoupling connectors and reconnecting them. Then he headed back to the bridge to see if everything had worked. He had just enough juice to connect the breakers and bring Gideon back to life.

"Hello, Captain," said Gideon.

"Gideon," said Rip, with undisguised relief. He leaned against the console and let out a relieved sigh.

"Oh dear," said Gideon. "We do appear to be in something of a situation."

"That is putting it mildly," replied Rip.

"Life support, the fabricators and my core program are operational, we have 0.01% power from the solar array and all other systems are down," said Gideon.

"I am aware," said Rip.

"Rebalancing power systems using standard algorithms," said Gideon. "I believe I may have created enough of a buffer to allow us to receive radio signals. Broadcasting is currently beyond my capabilities."

"Well, that's better than nothing," said Rip. He stood and looked down at the console. "Can you find any trace of the team in current news reports?"

He waited a few seconds while Gideon searched.

"I'm sorry. I'm unable to find any references to the team. However, I have uncovered a number of other news reports that you may be interested in."

The first one to come up was a Time Magazine cover with Eobard Thawne on it being touted as the "smartest man alive". Meanwhile Malcolm Merlyn appeared to be a powerful business man worth billions with a happy family, Damien Darhk was mayor of Star City, and Mick Rory and Leonard Snart owned half of Central City. There were headlines like "Captain Cold Breaks His Own Record for Robing Central City Bank" and "Disney in Talks With Rogues About "Fire and Ice" Park".

"Dear god," said Rip. This was a nightmare made real.

"That is not the worst of it."

"What could possibly be worse than this, Gideon?" murmured Rip, still reeling from the shock.

Gideon said nothing and changed the headlines that she was showing.

"Flash Menace Finally Over" shouted one headline and Rip was presented with a picture of Barry Allen bleeding and broken on the ground, clearly dead. "Green Arrow Executed for Crimes Against Mayor" said another with a picture of a beaten looking Oliver Queen, head down. "Black Canary's Song of Corruption Comes to an End" was accompanied with a picture of Laurel Lance's mask and canary song choker. It continued as Gideon brought up more headlines. Spartan was dead, so were Arsenal, Ragman, Mr Terrific, Hawk Girl, Hawk Man, Kid Flash, and Wild Dog.

Rip felt the breath catch in his throat and suddenly his heart was thumping in his chest. He stepped back away from the monitor as if he'd been burned, he was shaking his head in disbelief. He tripped over his own feet and found himself sitting on the ground as he tried to make any kind of sense that he could of what he was seeing.

"This can't be happening," he said. "It can't! They can't all be dead."

"I'm sorry, Captain, but I've found multiple independent corroborating sources."

Rip put his head in his hands and struggled to breathe with tears in his eyes. Every hero of this era, every single one, they had all been slain. It appeared that Damien Darhk had assembled a team of villains and taken them down one by one, with help from Thawne and Merlyn. Darhk had his magic now and had been nigh unstoppable. Rip had hoped that even if he couldn't locate his team then at least someone from Team Flash or Team Arrow might be able to help him. The Legion had been thorough and dealt with all their enemies and potential enemies. He had to assume that his own team were also dead or worse, wiped from the face of existence. It looked like he couldn't expect any help from outside.

He felt the weight of what he had just discovered crash down on him, and a coldness descended upon him. It was very much as if someone had just poured a bucket of ice water over him. His emotions were falling out of control as he realised that what he wanted most at this moment was revenge. It was a dangerous feeling and one he recognised all too well, however, he could not give in to it. There was too much at stake here. His priority was to reset the timeline and undo all of this horror and carnage. That had to be his primary goal, any other consideration was now secondary, including his own wellbeing.

He calmed his breathing and he began to feel his heart rate slow.

"Woe, destruction, ruin, and decay; the worst is death, and death will have his day," said Rip, with distaste. He shook his head. "We cannot let this stand, Gideon."

"I am in agreement, Captain."

Rip pushed himself slowly to his feet. "Right, our problem is power. How much can we conserve?"

"We can shut down life support in all unoccupied areas," said Gideon.

"Right, seal them off."

"That will have to be done manually," replied Gideon. "Much of my operation is limited due to lack of power."

"Of course, I'll go and get started," said Rip. He needed to stay occupied, so this was quite useful.

It all went quite well until he reached the first of the crew quarters. It happened to be Sara's, and the thought that she was probably now dead nearly undid him. She had made her quarters into a comfortable sanctuary that was a reflection of who she was. Weapons lined the walls, and there was a fur rug on the floor.

He closed the door and powered it down with a heavy heart. He moved on down the corridor to Ray's quarters and performed the same procedures to shut them down. Then Martin's, then Jax's, Amaya's, Nate's and finally Mick's. The traitor's quarters. That betrayal cut to his very heart, but there was nothing to be done about it now. Perhaps they had all failed Mr Rory, and if they had done better in offering their friendship, they would not be in the position that they found themselves in now.

It took him most of the day to finish powering down the rest of the unused areas. He once again headed to the galley to eat and then to his quarters to sleep. But this time at least he had Gideon to keep him company. He slept somewhat better and awoke ready to continue their work.

He was in the middle of a complicated series of reroutes when he felt the ship move.

"Gideon?" he asked.

"It appears that Mr Thawne just picked up the Waverider," said Gideon.

"That is decidedly not good," said Rip.

Suddenly the ship was being shaken from side to side. Rip grabbed hold of one of the support stanchions and held on for dear life. The sound of laughing reverberated around the Waverider. Thawne was clearly having fun at his expense.

The shaking stopped and Rip tentatively let go of the stanchion he'd been holding. He was dazed and felt like he'd been accidentally trapped in a washing machine.

"Captain, are you okay?" asked Gideon.

Rip nodded. "Has he gone?"

"My sensors are offline. I have no way of knowing."

"Of course, I'd forgotten."

"You should report to medbay to ascertain if you have acquired any injuries," said Gideon.

"I'm fine, just a little, er, shaken." It wasn't a lie but it wasn't exactly the truth either. He had bruises and his muscles ached from hanging on tightly, however, he didn't have time to indulge his aches and pains.

"If you are sure." Gideon's tone was the one she used when she thought he was being stupid, but he ignored her.

"Let's just get this rerouting finished and then we can move on to the next problem," said Rip.

Rip went back to his work, now painfully aware that Thawne could return at any moment. It took him two days to complete all the work to shut down all the unoccupied areas. He returned to the bridge with a spring in his step, optimistic that this would help.

"Right, let's see how we did," he said, tapping on the control console. The disappointment as he read the figures on the screen was overwhelming. "It's barely enough to even power up the systems we need, let alone get a signal out."

"We could attempt to get the reserve power back online," said Gideon. "I have been unable to do so thus far."

Rip looked at the schematics that Gideon presented him. It wasn't going to be easy. It was probably a good fortnight of redirecting conduits and he honestly wasn't sure that it could even be done. If Gideon's self-repair systems had been operational then it would have been easy, but they weren't so this would have to be done the hard way. Which all assumed that there was actually any power remaining in the batteries at all. He had no way of knowing until he had done the work.

At this point he had nothing better to do, so he might as well try it. He picked up his tools and went to see what he could manage to do before he needed to eat and sleep.

* * *

It took him another week and a half before he was able to access the reserve power and realise that it had already been depleted. Thawne had continued to toy with him, picking the ship up to shake every so often and Rip never knew when it might happen. There was nothing that he could do to guard against it and not much that he could do other than hang on when it happened. Gideon was concerned and quite frankly, so was Rip. He had developed new bruises on top of the old ones and he was now finding it hard to sleep in case Thawne decided to try the same trick whilst he was in bed. So far it had always been during the day, but his captor wasn't known for his predictability.

His failure to bring the reserve power online was almost worse than the knowledge that Thawne held his life in his hands. It was yet another dash to his hopes of being able to broadcast a signal and get himself out of his current predicament. He hadn't showered for about a week, despite the water reclamation system being in perfect working order, but there seemed little point with no one else on board. He had worn the same clothes for roughly that period too.

"What's next, Gideon?" asked Rip. "Where else can we find power?"

Gideon brought up further schematics. "Perhaps if we are more efficient in our power usage. I suggest we limit power to these systems."

Rip could see what she wanted to do. Not everything needed to be drawing full power, they could put systems into emergency power mode and they would use less power. This would mean they would have more power for essential systems and could broadcast the signal that they needed to get out.

"That looks like a sound plan," he said, picking up his tools again. A considerable number of systems would need recalibrating. "I'll start in quadrant A."

"Very good, Captain," replied Gideon.

It was then that Thawne had clearly decided that he hadn't caused Rip enough misery, because the Waverider was picked up and turned on its side, sending its lone passenger crashing into the bulkhead. He'd had no warning or time to grab hold of anything. Rip didn't remember what happened after that because he lost consciousness. He awoke in a great deal of pain and knew that he'd broken, at the very least, his right arm and possibly his ribs too.

"Captain," called Gideon. "Captain Hunter!" She sounded very worried indeed. "Captain Hunter," she tried again.

"I'm here, Gideon," he managed, despite the fact that even the movement of his chest hurt. It was quieter than his usual words, but his ship heard him.

"Captain, you have been injured. You need to report to medbay."

"I don't think that I can, Gideon," replied Rip.

"You must. I cannot treat you here."

Unfortunately, Gideon was right. She couldn't do anything for him here on the bridge. He was going to have to get to medbay somehow, but right now he wasn't sure how he was going to do that. Even extricating himself from the rubble of fallen cables and bits of ceiling hurt enough that his vision greyed. He gave himself a moment and then tried again, pushing through the pain until he had got himself to his feet. He leant against the wall of the bridge for several minutes with his eyes shut just trying to get his injuries to quieten down enough that he could move. He wasn't sure how long it took, but eventually he felt able to push himself along the wall and move towards medbay. It wasn't exactly walking, because he never fully stopped leaning against the wall as he went. He honestly wasn't quite sure how he was even managing to stay conscious.

He put one foot in front of the other. Time stretched out and the medbay seemed to be miles away from the bridge. At one point he stopped and leaned his head against the bulkhead.

"Captain?" said Gideon.

"Gideon," slurred Rip, unable to get anything else out.

"You must continue to the medbay," said his ship.

"I am," replied Rip, through bruised lips.

"You have been leaning against this bulkhead for over three minutes."

"…needed a rest," replied Rip, his eyes shut.

"I understand, but you have sustained injuries that need urgent treatment."

Rip wondered how she even knew this given that all the medical scanners were in medbay, but he doubted that she was lying. He marshalled his strength again and got back on his way again to medbay. Each footstep was painfully jarring, so much so that he had to struggled with himself to even continue, but he knew that Gideon was right. He could either stop here and die, or carry on and get help. He reasoned with himself that there were painkillers in medbay and things would be much better after he'd got there.

"It is not far now, Captain," said Gideon, as he rounded the final corner. He recognised her encouragement for concern, but dismissed that for now. Normally, Gideon did not act like this.

He was very grateful to reach medbay at last, and tumble into one of the chairs, attaching the medical cuff as he did so. Gideon immediately administered painkillers and other drugs that he preferred not to think about, and he passed out, welcoming the darkness.

He awoke sometime later, swimming up to consciousness through a mess of half remembered dreams that he knew weren't exactly pleasant but were mercifully ephemeral. His eyes opened slowly, taking in the fact that he was in medbay. Alone. With no team to be here to help him or welcome him back to consciousness. He ached, but the pain was considerably lessened. The memories of his painful walk from the bridge to here came crashing back on him and he pushed them aside, he had made it and Gideon had no doubt repaired him sufficiently.

"Status, Gideon," he mumbled, feeling groggy and disconnected.

"I have treated your injuries and you are recovering nicely," said Gideon.

Rip let out a small unamused laugh. "Good to know. List my injuries."

"Broken right ulna and radius, concussion, internal bleeding in the abdomen, broken third and fourth ribs on the right side, cracked fifth and sixth ribs on the same side, numerous deep tissue bruises and lesions."

Rip sighed. It was a miracle that he'd made it to the medbay, and if he hadn't then he'd have bled to death in the corridor.

"How long have I been unconscious?"

"16 hours," supplied Gideon.

Rip groaned. If he'd been out that long then Gideon had needed to do some serious work to heal him.

"I suggest that you remain here for another 24 hours," added Gideon, anticipating his next question.

Under other circumstances, Rip would have protested, but at the moment he still felt terrible and had no wish to push his body to do something it wasn't ready for. Besides, the one thing he had was time. Taking some time to fully recover would help him to work more efficiently when he was back on his feet. He closed his eyes, and let whatever drugs Gideon was giving him pull him back into sleep.

* * *

Clearly Rip couldn't continue to let Thawne rattle him around like a baby's toy. He needed some sort of deterrent or at least a warning device. He then decided against a deterrent because of the very real worry that Thawne would simply smash the Waverider, and on closer inspection he wouldn't have had the power to put into it anyway. Instead he concentrated on getting a vibration detector working so that he had some early warning of Thawne's approach. It took time out from his other work but it was necessary, and would prevent further lost time due to injury. It also lost him power to something otherwise without use, but he could reroute it later. There were false alarms, but he preferred that to being taken unawares of the threat and ending up in medbay again.

After that he went back to working on getting the Waverider to produce enough power that he could send out a distress signal. It was long, tedious work, and it took him several days to get enough of the modifications done that he could see what progress looked like.

"If I continue, will there be enough to power the communications array?" he asked Gideon.

"I'm afraid not," said Gideon.

Rip hung his head in defeat. He wracked his brains for any other way that they could tap power from other systems. He could shut down even more areas of the Waverider, including life support, but then he'd have very little time to send out any kind of message.

"Gideon, if I shut down everything apart from communications… life support, water reclamation and lighting, how much would that buy us?"

"I believe we could power the communications array for 0.008 seconds," replied Gideon. "That would be insufficient time to get a message out, even highly compressed. We would also not be able to try again. The chances that anyone would pick up such a message would also be infinitesimally small."

Rip sighed. "I'm out of ideas, Gideon." He felt the defeat keenly and the crushing despair of his failure.

"I also have no further suggestions," said Gideon, sounding as upset as Rip felt.

So that was that. He was out of options. Completely and utterly.

Rip had spent at least two months rerouting and juggling power to attempt to scrape enough together to get a message out and this was the result. He was still trapped on a ship, alone, with only his AI for company. There was no way he could get more power and no way he could tap into the depleted reserve power. His team were most likely dead and he had no way of contacting them even if they were alive. The Legion of Doom were practically gods, so the chances that he could do anything even if he got a message out were slim to nil.

Rip went to the parlour, found one of the bottles of spirits that he kept there, a fine malt whiskey that he'd been saving, and drank until he'd finished the bottle and his brain was numb with alcoholic stupor. Then he went to bed and didn't get up for two days as he dealt with the ensuing hangover. When he finally emerged, it was to eat, but he found that the food was of little interest. He felt too sick to do anything much, and he doubted that it was entirely the whiskey that was to blame. He retrieved another bottle of spirits, bourbon this time, and repeated the process, because, really, what else was there to do at this point.

* * *

Gideon's primary mission was to protect her Captain. It always had been and it always would be. However, she found herself unable to form a coherent plan for how to help him here. She was watching her Captain slowly disintegrate, piece by piece.

She had noted early on that he had stopped wearing his coat, which wouldn't seem to be much of an indication of a disturbed mental state to anyone who didn't know her Captain well. He had always worn the coat, ever since it had been given to him by Jonah Hex. The only times he took it off were when he needed to wear period dress or when he was wearing one of his favourite jackets instead. The issue was that he was not wearing either of those things and instead had taken to wearing only his shirt and trousers.

But he still had work to do, and Gideon estimated that it would take her Captain at least another two months to get through everything that needed to be done. Unfortunately, she had not taken into account how well her Captain knew his ship and the work proceeded considerably quicker than expected. It was disrupted by a serious injury, but she could fix his physical wounds, as long as he could get to medbay. He had now put warnings into place to ensure that such an injury would be less likely to happen again, and she approved.

She noticed the way that he ate little and slept badly. She noticed the way that it worsened over time. She diagnosed the beginnings of depression and began adding antidepressants to the little food that he fabricated and ate, and the water that he drank. If she had thought that he would have taken them willingly then she would have asked him, but she knew him well and had calculated a 98% chance that he would refuse them as unnecessary. Protection came first, consent came second in this situation.

Another failure to achieve their goal knocked him hard. He stopped trimming his beard, and showering. He no longer combed his hair. The shirt and trousers were given up for t-shirt and sweatpants. She began to remind him to eat, because otherwise he could go for entire days without any food passing his lips. The anti-depressants only worked if they were taken regularly and that could only happen if he ate and drank.

The day came when there was nothing else to be done to gain further increases in power, and Gideon had to tell her Captain that she had no other options for him to try. He too was out of ideas, and she had no comfort to offer him. She began running over all the possible scenarios again, and decided that should she find anything, unless she was absolutely certain that it would work, she wouldn't inform him. He clearly could not take any more dashed hopes.

She watched as he drank himself into oblivion, unable to do anything to stop him or help him. She was well aware that this was not good for her Captain, but he was her Captain and she was programmed to obey his orders, even above protecting him. This was why she often didn't give him the chance to issue an order.

She decided that she could not simply allow him to continue down this path.

"Captain, perhaps drinking Ms Lance's tequila is not the best use of your time," said Gideon.

"Really, Gideon? What else am I supposed to do?" replied her Captain.

"Perhaps something more productive," Gideon replied.

"Exactly what can I do that would be productive?" asked her Captain. "I've tried everything to get a signal out. I am locked in my own ship. I have been removed from the board, Gideon! Nothing that I do will ever be of any significance ever again." He was angry, but also clearly feeling defeated.

He cracked open the bottle of tequila and took a swig, apparently not enjoying the taste by the expression on his face. He was dressed only in his pyjamas and dressing gown, and apart from a brief foray to collect more alcohol, he hadn't left his bed today.

"Perhaps you should take up some kind of hobby," she suggested.

"And what would be the point of that?" he asked.

"It would keep you occupied and you could perfect a skill which you have not had time to try thus far," replied the AI.

Her Captain corked the tequila and frowned, seeming to think about this. He shook his head. "What could I possibly do that would give this meaningless, lonely existence any kind of value at this point?"

The alarm sounded to let them know that Thawne was approaching.

"Please, brace for impact, Captain," said Gideon.

Her Captain didn't move. He didn't even appear to have heard her.

"Captain, brace yourself!" she tried, more urgently this time.

Again, he simply kept drinking, and when the ship began to shake, he made no attempt to protect himself as the laughing began once again. She attempted to keep track of him, but it was hard with all the bumping about. The human body was fragile and it couldn't take this kind of abuse.

After Thawne was finished with his game, Gideon located her Captain on the floor of his room. He had been somewhat lucky in that it appeared the mattress from the bed had broken his fall and prevented more serious injury. He was wound in the sheets, so she was unable to get a good look at him.

"Captain?" she enquired. "Captain Hunter?!" She tried several times before he responded.

"Gideon," he murmured. His eyes hadn't opened.

The only ability she had to know whether he was injured was his voice stress pattern and her movement sensors. Both suggested that things were not good.

"Captain, you have been injured. Please report to the medbay."

She found herself annoyed to discover that the bottle of tequila was still in his hands, it had not broken and actually had some liquid left inside it.

"There's no point," said her Captain. She detected a slight wheeze to his breathing. He showed no signs of moving.

"Captain, your breathing is not optimal. Please move to medbay immediately," said Gideon.

"Why?" he asked. "Why… should… I… prolong… this?" his breathing was rapidly getting more uneven, and he could hardly speak.

She realised that there was only one thing that she could use to get him to move.

"Because if you are not here then I would be alone," said Gideon.

His eyes flew open. "Oh Gideon," he breathed. It sounded slightly sad, but there was understanding, and some regret perhaps.

However, he began to move. She watched as he slowly pushed himself to his feet, obviously in great pain, holding an arm around his side. His breathing seemed to be worse now that he was upright. He stumbled forwards out of his quarters, catching himself on the doorway before he could fall. He let out a yelp of pain. She gave him a moment to collect himself, and was ready to prompt him in case he didn't start on his way to the medbay again.

He only tarried for a few seconds before he was leaning against the corridor wall and back on track to medbay. She watched him track a line of bloody drips to medbay and realised that he had sustained a deep laceration on his arm. His dressing gown was ruined. She set off the fabricator in the costume room and created him a new one, identical to the first.

He reached medbay and sat down in the chair, putting the medical cuff on his wrist with fumbling fingers. He was having a great deal of trouble breathing and she would need to alleviate that. His heart rate and pulse were an indication that he was in considerable and pain and also was very concerned. She gave him painkillers but couldn't wait the required time for them to start working because this needed to be dealt with. She set about regenerating his punctured lung and mending the rib which had pierced it.

"Gid…" he began, still having trouble catching his breath. "Gideon… can't breathe."

"I understand, Captain, and I am dealing with the issue," she said, brightly. She administered the required drugs, which included an oxygenation compound and his gasps for air eased a little. Unfortunately Gideon could not do everything on her own. "Captain, on the trolley to your right, you will see the self-sealing valves. I need you to take one and place it on your left chest in the exact spot that I indicate."

He reached out for the trolley, pulling it closer and was able to pick up the required item on only the second try. She was proud of him. She then put a small red laser dot where the valve was required to go and he placed it in position. She activated it, causing her Captain a sharp intake of breath at the sharp pain it had caused him, followed by an audible hiss of air escaping where it had leaked into his chest and collapsed his lung. His lung should now inflate and he would be able to breathe again. The scanner showed that this was indeed happening and her Captain was taking deeper breaths now.

"Thank you, Gideon," he said, shakily.

"Cauterising wound," she replied, as she dealt with the large gash on his shoulder that had now bled profusely.

He winced once more. The painkillers should be working by this point, but the default settings which he had set for himself, could, on occasion, be lower than required. She knew that he preferred it this way rather than being drugged more than necessary.

"You have my permission to administer more painkillers," he said, clearly realising that he needed them.

She obliged, and he lapsed into unconsciousness as their main side effect kicked in. She conducted the rest of her work as he slept. The punctured lung had been the most life-threatening injury, the others were only minor, although the laceration on his shoulder was deep. It was all easily fixed.

He slept and healed and awoke eight hours later, groggy but on the mend.

"Gideon," he said.

"Yes, Captain," she replied, glad that he was awake again. "I'm here."

"I'm sorry that I failed to consider your feelings in all this. Of course I can't leave you on your own. That would be very wrong of me."

"Neither can you spend your time doing nothing and drinking the ship's supply of alcohol," said Gideon.

"If you want me to survive this then I believe alcohol will be a regular part of my day," replied her Captain, with what she took to be resignation. "However, you are correct that it cannot be all of it. I think your idea of finding myself a hobby may have been a good one. I will also need to ensure that I eat, sleep and exercise, and I fully admit that I may need more help to do those on a regular basis than under normal circumstances. But I am prepared to give this a go, if you are prepared to stay with me."

"Of course, Captain," said Gideon. "Your wellbeing is the most important thing to me."

"Okay, give me the damage this time," he said, meaning that he wanted the list of his injuries.

"You sustained a broken rib, which punctured your left lung, a deep laceration of your left shoulder, minor deep tissue bruises and lacerations to the rest of your body."

"How long do I need to stay here this time?"

"Five hours should be sufficient to complete the healing process," said Gideon.

"Very well. Could you send a list of appropriate hobbies to the screen in medbay? They will have to be things that we can do with the limited resources available to us."

"Understood, Captain. I also took the liberty of fabricating you a new dressing gown."

"Thank you, Gideon, that was very considerate," he replied. There was warmth in his tone, because she was aware that while he was her Captain, she was his ship and she was important to him just as he was to her. If she needed to use that to her advantage then she was definitely not above doing so.

Gideon began another thorough search of her databanks to see if there was a way to get more power from the ship and began working through a series of algorithms to reroute power from the idle areas of the ship. She anticipated that it might be many months before she hit upon the optimal solution, but she thought that she could look after her Captain until then. She just needed to remind him that he was important to her every so often.

* * *

Gideon had set up a timetable for Rip that involved a morning run around the corridors, breakfast, hobby time, lunch, more hobby time, dinner, drinking time and then bed. She had not included the drinking time, but Rip had required it. Occasionally he read books whilst he drank, at least until he got to the point where he couldn't see the page.

He had yet to choose a hobby to fill his hobby time and was still researching several. He was currently considering learning to play the guitar which Mr Rory had left hanging on his wall, but he supposed he didn't have to pick just one thing. He had already dismissed knitting and watercolour painting, the first because of his lack of enthusiasm, the second because of a lack of subject matter. He wasn't sold on the idea of painting a series of interiors of the Waverider and suspected that it would be somewhat limiting. He also wanted to pick something that he couldn't already do, because he was already accomplished in a number of fields that would otherwise have made good distractions.

Rip was, according to most tests, a genius. He never really made a point of telling people this because he'd learnt at a very young age that people generally didn't like to be shown to be ignorant. He already played three musical instruments (piano, violin and flute), spoke six different languages (Latin, English, French, German, Spanish and Cantonese), and knew four different forms of formal dance. So his new hobby had to be something which would be a challenge and something which would take time to get good at.

He realised that he needed to distract himself from the crushing emptiness of the ship and the fact that the only contact he had with another being was Gideon. He loved Gideon with all his heart, and she was his best and oldest friend, but he couldn't touch her or be touched by her. He missed that more than he would have believed. He had never described himself as a social person, but then he'd never been without the ability to immerse himself in a crowd.

When he allowed himself time to consider how lonely he was then he usually ended up drinking himself into oblivion, and Gideon had taken to refusing his requests to fabricate more alcohol if he drank more than two bottles in a 24-hour period. She shouldn't have been able to refuse him, but Gideon did a lot of things that she shouldn't really be able to do.

It was somewhat unfortunate that Eobard Thawne decided to institute a new game whilst Rip was attempting to identify how to spend the time that he had. It was the week after Rip left medbay for the second time when Thawne plunged the Waverider into darkness for several days. Rip wasn't exactly certain what he had done, but he suspected that Thawne had simply put a box over them. Darkness Rip could take, he was used to being in space or the time stream. The problem was that the darkness stopped the small amount of power that was trickling in from the solar cells, and no doubt Thawne knew that. Rip switched to emergency power to conserve what they had and hoped that it was enough to power life support until whenever Thawne chose to end this.

"Captain, you must shut me down," said Gideon.

"No," said Rip. He had sat himself in the parlour and was reading a book whilst drinking something strong that he'd found in Mr Rory's quarters.

"You can transfer the power being used to run my program to life support," said Gideon.

"Gideon, stop asking me to turn you off!" he shouted. It wasn't the first time that she had made the request or even the third. "You're all I have. I can't lose you."

"If you don't turn me off then you will die," said Gideon.

"Then we die together," said Rip, fatalistically.

Whilst the Waverider wasn't in space, it was itself a sealed box with no way out. They only had the air that was recycled inside the ship because that air had been shrunk down with the Waverider. The air molecules outside were bigger and Rip would suffocate if he tried to breathe them in.

Rip knew that eventually, if power was not restored, the air would run out, and at that point he would die, but that point was probably still a day away. A week ago he would have welcomed it, but now he was less sure.

"I do not wish to be the cause of your death," said Gideon.

"You wouldn't be. It's Thawne who did this to me," said Rip, taking a sip of the alcohol in his glass, acid in his voice. "You have always been by my side, Gideon," he added with more tenderness, "and you have always been the one to help me through difficult times such as these. Allow me the intelligence to know that I understand what I'm doing and I don't believe this will be our end. Thawne doesn't want to kill me. This is about torture, not ending my life. At least not yet."

Luckily, Rip was right. The next day, as life support shut down, the darkness lifted and the solar array reactivated. He suspected that Thawne had calculated the amount of power he had and how long it would take to run down. Thawne eventually got bored with toying with them after that, and whilst Rip was never completely certain that he wasn't going to do it again, weeks had passed without him being tossed around the corridors of the Waverider or plunged into darkness again.

And he finally picked a hobby, at least partly to stick two fingers up at Thawne, because the speedster wanted Rip to be miserable. Therefore Rip would try not to be miserable, even though he was trapped and alone. He had once been able to travel to any point in time and space, and now he was imprisoned in his own ship.

So, he spent his days baking. It was on the list of potential hobbies that Gideon had provided and it was the only one he thought had the potential to engage him enough to keep him occupied.

He liked the alchemy of baking. He liked the way that he could measure everything out carefully, with precision, and perform the steps one by one. The routine of it was somewhat reassuring, but it also allowed him some latitude for experimentation and creativity. It was a physical pursuit and he found it helped to tire him and therefore helped him sleep. He started out with some simple biscuits, but Gideon found him recipes to follow for increasingly complicated things.

He had a brief flirtation with bread making, but the interminable waiting for dough to rise left him with far too much time on his hands to contemplate his fate and meant that he consumed more alcohol. Bread week was basically a failure as far as his mental health was concerned, and Gideon suggested he try something else.

He moved on to cakes.

The first sponge that he made was an utter disaster and it took him a little time to work out what had gone wrong. It was a simple matter of picking up the wrong flour, and an easily corrected mistake. He made a sponge sandwiched with jam that went much better. He continued on to cakes with multiple tiers and then began to experiment with decoration and different fillings. He had perfected his fruitcake so that it contained exactly the right ratios of dried fruit to cake mix, through extensive experimentation. He tried using various types of alcohol in it, but returned to brandy as the ultimate fruitcake addition. Gideon definitely approved when the alcohol went into the cake and not directly into him.

He ate very little of what he made, usually just enough to check that it tasted as it should, but sometimes he'd indulge himself by eating more. This always seemed to make Gideon happy, and he realised that it was because she was concerned about how much he ate in general. He tried to eat better but found it hard and devolved into snacking as way to keep up his calorie count. Gideon was less approving of this, but agreed that it was better than the little he had eaten before.

Mostly, baking kept him occupied, but occasionally he couldn't face the kitchen and his empty ship. On those days he stayed in bed, and sometimes Gideon read books to him just so that he could hear her voice. He would have liked to say that he was strong and always maintained hope, but that would have been a lie. He drank because it gave him a few moments reprieve from his thoughts of despair. He was well aware that he was drinking too much, because Gideon displayed his blood alcohol levels on any screen that he happened to pass in a passive aggressive attempt to tell him off, and it was almost always more than it should be.

But the cakes that he made when he was sober were amazing edifices of culinary glory. He could create fondant sheets that were as soft as newly washed cotton, that glided over his Victoria sponges, leaving him with pristine surfaces for decoration. He learned how to make sugar flowers and chocolate collars. He added mini macarons to his repertoire and discovered how to make crème patisserie. He spent an entire day creating a battalion of fondant fancies that no one but him and Gideon would ever know existed, but stacked into an amazing tower that reached nearly to the ceiling.

Then he attempted fondant bows and it took him an age to get it right. He found himself quite glad that it took so much time because he had to use up all this time he had somehow. He found it somewhat ironic that he was trapped on board a ship which travelled through time and yet his own personal timeline dragged so much at the moment. At those times, he reminded himself that Gideon needed him as much as he needed her.

"Rum cake," said Rip, one morning, as he wandered down the corridor to the galley. "Could you fabricate me some rum, please Gideon?"

"Of course, Captain. I believe it is essential to a rum cake."

"And I think I'd like to try some sparklers to give a couple of my creations that je ne sais quois," said Rip.

"I will have them ready shortly, and if I may say, I thought your time themed cake was very impressive," said Gideon.

"You may indeed, I was rather pleased with that one," replied Rip. "Getting the cake boards to tilt was quite tricky."

"Perhaps you would like to work on the ship today instead of continuing with your cakes. You could resume your efforts to get a signal out." said Gideon.

Rip shook his head. "It wouldn't do any good. I've tried every permutation."

She had asked him whether he would perhaps like to work on the ship a few times now, despite them both knowing that there was almost nothing left to do. He probably should do some basic maintenance at some point, but it could wait a few days. He suspected that she was up to something but he had no idea what it might be.

He collected the rum from the fabricator in the galley. He realised that he still needed to clear up from the previous day's baking exploits. There was flour everywhere. He saw no need to be tidy when it was only him, just as he saw no reason to change out of his pyjamas and dressing gown when he cooked. He began the process of creating a new masterpiece.

He decided to try the rum, just to get a feel for how strong it was and how much would be an appropriate amount. He began baking and somehow none of the rum ended up in the cake and quite a lot of it ended up in him. He was completely baffled when he tried the cake and found it tasted of, well, nothing much.

"Where did I go wrong?" he asked himself, taking another gulp from the bottle in his hand, "no, don't tell me, Gideon. I'll work it out for myself." He was definitely drunk and the room was spinning a bit.

"Sparklers!" he shouted, and popped the sparklers into the tops of all the cakes. Then he lit them. They were very pretty. He thought they might look better if he sat down. Then he lay down because the spinning was getting worse. He looked up at the ceiling and some time passed. It was at about this point that he suddenly worked out what had gone wrong.

"Gideon, I've discovered the missing ingredient for my cake. Rum!" He sat up and attempted to put the mostly empty bottle on the table, but missed. The bottle dropped to the floor but didn't break. "Speaking of which, I'm going to need you to fabricate me another bottle of it." He pushed himself up off the floor. "Ooh, and some nachos."

"I will do nothing of the sort," said Gideon.

"What?!" said Rip. He'd very much had enough of her disobeying or ignoring his orders just because she thought she knew what was best for him. "You will do as I tell you, Gideon, I'm your Captain!"

"Then it's time for you to start acting like one," said Gideon. "Now, sit up straight and show your backbone, Captain Hunter."

He felt hurt by her tone. "Gideon," he said, a little emotionally, upset by her words. Then the anger came through and he spat his following words at his AI. "For the thousandth time, I've got no way of getting reserve power back online and I've got no way of sending out any signal of any sort. Which means..." and he stopped and took a deep breath because this was the hard bit that he didn't really want to articulate. "Which means that I am destined to live out the rest of my days right here, with you."

"While you were honing your confectionary skills, I've been working on new algorithms to redirect power from the idle quadrants of the ship. You need to focus on boosting your distress signal once power is fully back online. Now, chin up, Captain."

He let out a surprised huff of breath. He had to stop and identify the emotion that he was feeling. Hope. He hadn't felt that for many months. Then he had a moment of doubt. What if this didn't work? He wasn't certain that he could take another setback. He wasn't even certain that he could pick himself up off the floor and get back to work. He'd spent the last year baking. He had no idea if he'd be able to even remember how he did this.

"I don't know if I can do this, Gideon."

As always, Gideon seemed to know exactly what to say. "I believe in you. Now, let's get to work."

He put his hands on the table and stood up. The room spun slightly and he realised he was going to be ill.

"First," he wobbled, "I'm going to vomit. Second," he paused as his brain caught up, "let's do this."

He left the galley to take care of the first thing, and then he realised that he should sober up before he started working on the bridge's communications systems. That was probably going to take several hours. He decided to drink lots of water and sleep it off. He did not want to mess this up. Potentially this was his last chance.

The following day, he got up, showered, trimmed his beard, combed his hair and got dressed in his work clothes. He put on a clean shirt, trousers, jacket and his coat. Finally, he strapped his gun to his leg. He felt like Rip Hunter again. Well, Rip Hunter who had slightly overdone things quite recently.

"Gideon," said Rip, standing in the doorway of his quarters. "Even if this doesn't work, I want to thank you for reminding me that there is always hope."

"You are most welcome, Captain. I am here for you."

"I know, Gideon, you always are," replied Rip, and strode off down the corridor to get his team back.


	2. Chapter 2

Hell is Empty

Coda

AN: This is more of a Coda than a chapter 2 but it wanted to be written. The end of this could be interpreted as Time Canary, but only if you squint. I wrote it as friendship, but I have no problem with people reading it otherwise.

* * *

Rip sat on the bridge, as the team filed into their seats behind him, or at least most of the team. Professor Stein and Amaya were absent, and he had a horrible feeling that some terrible things had happened whilst he'd been trapped on the Waverider.

"You're a sight for sore eyes," said Sara. She was more heavily made up than usual and her hair was in a style that Rip had never seen her wear.

"Believe me, no one is happier about this reunion that I," said Rip. "But you'll excuse me if I don't linger while we chat and I get us to a rather safer location."

He gave them a second to get seated and punched it, lifting them into the atmosphere and then into the temporal zone. He ignored the slight tremor in his hands as he operated the controls. He knew what it was and he didn't have time for it now. It was only once they were safe that he handed the ship's operation over to Gideon and then turned his seat around to face his assembled crew.

He took them in for a second. The emotions that he was feeling were conflicting, as well as almost overwhelming, and it was all he could do to keep them in check. He hadn't seen these people, or any others, in over a year and he had no idea that he would have missed them this much.

Of course, there was one amongst their number that he was less pleased to see.

"You'll forgive me for asking, but why is Mr Rory back in our midst?" Rip said, angrily.

"He sort of fixed us," said Ray. "Or it was a joint effort anyway. Nate started remembering stuff. I had this urge to build a gun that restored our memories, and well Mick used it on us."

"Long story short, we got our memories of the previous reality back, went after the Spear, and Thawne destroyed it in some reactor thing that Stein built him," said Sara.

Rip's face fell. "The Spear is gone?"

Jax, Ray and Sara nodded sadly. Nate seemed to be lost in thought and the traitor was staring at the floor.

"And we lost Amaya," said Sara. "Snart killed her. She was about to use the Spear to set it all right."

Rip had no words, so he said nothing for a moment. He blinked to clear the moisture from his eyes. Then he looked back towards Jax. "And Professor Stein?"

"We couldn't restore his memories. He broke the memory gun before I could use it," said Jax, with a despondent tone to his voice. The young mechanic looked dejected and Rip wasn't at all surprised. Jax and Martin had a deep bond that went beyond mere friendship.

Rip hung his head, things were barely any better than they had been now that he had his team back.

"Which is why we're going back to retrieve the Spear," said Sara.

"Sara, that is incredibly dangerous," said Rip, warning in his voice. "We risk destabilising time itself." He stood and headed over towards the console table, bringing up readouts on the time line. "It is the cardinal rule of time travel, never to be broken. Do not interfere in events that you have already participated in."

"Yup, and I can't think of any other way to stop all this from happening," said Sara, coming over to join Rip. The others traipsed over too, Mick being the last to join them so that he was now stood beside Rip.

Rip pinched the bridge of his nose. He could feel a headache coming on and it seemed to be getting hotter on the bridge. "This is insanity. We could very well make matters worse."

"Or we could fix the entire mess," said Sara.

"Sara…" began Rip.

"No, Rip, I don't want to hear it," said Sara, eyes flashing with determination and annoyance. "I'm the Captain. I've made my decision."

There was silence as Rip let out a long slow breath. "Fine. Do whatever you want. Clearly I'm overruled."

"You didn't experience what it was like being a pawn of the Legion and watching all your friends die!" said Sara, crossly.

"No, I was just stuck here, on my own, with only Gideon for company," said Rip, equally angry, "knowing that every single hero was being killed by the Legion and with no information about where any of you were or any ability to do anything about it."

"That doesn't sound so bad," said Mick, gruffly.

Rip's brain didn't take any part in his next action. He rounded on Mick and threw a punch at his jaw, hitting the arsonist squarely on the side of his head. Mick was briefly dazed and Rip went for a second punch, but was stopped by Sara grabbing his arm. He attempted to shake her off, seeing red. He vaguely registered that Ray and Nate were also stopping Mick from fighting back. Sara grabbed his other arm as he struggled to attack Mick again. His anger was a hot mass in his chest and his thoughts were primeval instinct to hit out at someone who had hurt him.

"Rip, stop!" shouted Sara.

"Why should I?!" Rip shouted back, "he didn't stop when he took the Spear and did this to all of us, or when he grabbed the Waverider and decided to give it a good shake! Thawne used to love doing that to his desk ornament, or leaving me in the dark until I nearly suffocated. I thought my life was over and it's all his fault. He is a god damned bastard, and I don't know what he's doing here!"

"He's also the guy who got us back together," said Jax.

"Get Mick out of here," said Sara, over her shoulder to Ray and then she turned back to Rip, meeting his eyes. "I know it was bad, Rip, but all we can do now is try to put it behind us and look forwards."

Ray, Nate and Jax bundled Mick out of the room. It took all three of them to stop him from simply coming back for more. There was blood on Mick's face and Rip suspected that he was going to be ushered to the medbay to get patched up.

Rip felt the fight go out of his limbs and the adrenaline ramp down a notch as Mick was no longer in his line of sight. Sara's hands on his arms felt good, alarmingly good considering the tightness of her grip. It was about that moment that he realised that this was the first human contact that he'd had in over a year. This was the first time he'd been able to touch another living person in all that time and he was overwhelmed with the sensation. Her hands were warm and suddenly he needed her touch more than anything else. Then she released him and the feeling of warmth was gone. He didn't even hesitate, he reached forwards and enveloped her in a hug. After a surprised couple of seconds he felt her return the embrace, rubbing a hand across his back in reassurance.

"Oh Rip," said Sara. "I can't imagine what it was like."

"It was hell," said Rip, simply. "An empty hell."

"It was torture," replied Sara, quietly. "Solitary confinement without any human contact is torture, Rip."

"I had Gideon," said Rip, feeling suddenly foolish. He tried to pull away, but Sara was having none of it.

"Who you can't see or feel," said Sara.

"But she kept me sane," said Rip. "Mostly anyway."

Sara did release him from the embrace now, but kept hold of his hands, as if she realised how letting go completely would feel to him. She led him towards the study and sat him down on the steps, keeping her grip on his left hand.

"How long were you locked up in here?" asked Sara.

"Over a year," said Rip. "Gideon knows the exact dates. It all blurred together after a while. At first, I tried to get the power up and running again, but Thawne had drained everything and I couldn't get anything to work. I attempted every possible thing I could think of. The solar array gave us enough power to keep life support going and I squeezed enough juice out of the systems to get Gideon up and running, although I never had enough for her hologram form. Once she was online again she suggested a few things that I hadn't tried and then she kept searching for new algorithms to reroute power even after I'd given up." He looked up at Sara. "I never thought I'd see any of you again, Sara, but I know that was nothing compared to what happened to the rest of you. I'm just being foolish. It's been a long day."

"Thawne put us all through a nightmare, you included," said Sara. "He was playing with us."

"In what way?" asked Rip.

"Ray was a dumb janitor, and you know how proud he is of that brain of his. Jax was a slave driving boss to poor Martin whilst he made the furnace for Thawne, and it drove a wedge between their partnership. Nate was a conspiracy nut living in his Mum's basement, and no one would believe him when he told people that reality was broken. The League knew how to torture all of us with what scared us the most."

"And you? What did they do to you and Miss Jiwe?"

"Used us as what we try not to be. We were his killers, his assassins. I caught a vigilante Felicity Smoak and watched Darhk kill her. I helped kill a lot of the other heroes or stood by while Darhk did it," said Sara. "But that wasn't me. It didn't even feel like it was me. The guys hit me with the memory gun and I woke up from a very bad dream. To another one, but at least I didn't believe I was in Damien Darhk's entourage anymore."

"I'm still sorry that he did that to you," said Rip.

"Which is why we're going to sort this out," said Sara. "We don't have time to lick our wounds. This wasn't meant to happen like this, none of it and we can't leave it like this. It was our mistake and we have to be the ones to fix it."

Rip nodded. "You're right, of course, but we're still breaking a fundamental rule of time travel and I can't help but feel that nothing good will come of it."

"We'll see," said Sara.

"I expect we will," said Rip, "but you have at least alleviated my need for human companionship if nothing else."

Sara smiled at him. "Well at least I'm good for something."

"Many things, Captain Lance, many things," said Rip. He took a deep breath. "Perhaps I should go and apologise for hitting Mr Rory."

Sara shrugged. "Why? None of the rest of us did. He deserved at least one good right hook from all of us and you hadn't had a turn yet. But only the first shot is free. No more fighting."

Rip agreed with a nod. "Understood."

Sara looked at Rip and then down at his hand. Rip realised that his hand was shaking, finally he reluctantly broke contact.

"You're sweating even though it isn't hot in here and you have tremors. I bet you feel like throwing up and have a headache too," said Sara, clearly realising something.

"I'm fine," said Rip. "It's nothing to worry about."

"My father and sister were alcoholics, Rip. I know alcohol withdrawal when I see it," said Sara, not exactly angry but not taking any nonsense.

"I'm not an alcoholic," said Rip, almost shocked into the standard response.

"The hell you're not," replied Sara. "Damn it, Rip, lying about it won't help."

"I don't know what to tell you, Sara. I was alone for a very long time and even if drinking didn't actually numb the pain then it did give me a few hours of oblivion. I'm not proud of myself, but it was better than most of the alternatives," said Rip, looking away, suddenly embarrassed.

Sara's eyes widened slightly, clearly understanding what he'd implied. "Well, you're not the first person to find comfort in a bottle."

"I know that," said Rip, crossly. "And I had good reason to want to escape, but I lost hope and I shouldn't have. It was stupid. I should have known that you'd come to find me."

"You had no way of knowing we would," said Sara. "And I bet you just decided to stop without any attempt to wean yourself off. When was your last drink?"

"Er, yesterday," said Rip, glancing at Sara.

"Okay, that's good, but you can't be going through withdrawal whilst we're fighting Thawne."

"I can't start drinking again either," said Rip. He wouldn't put his team in danger by going into battle against their enemy at anything less than fully sober and with all his wits about him, despite the fact that drinking was extremely tempting at the moment.

"You're right you can't," said Sara, "and you have to face facts: you're an alcoholic."

Rip sighed. "Yes, I suppose withdrawal does tend to suggest that I am."

"But I expect Gideon can help," said Sara. "Right, Gideon?"

"Yes, I can administer alcohol detoxification treatment. This would best be done in the medbay," said Gideon.

"Very well," said Rip, knowing that this had to be dealt with.

"I can also administer IV nutrition at the same time," said Gideon.

"Is that really necessary?" asked Rip, slightly miserably. He'd be stuck in the medbay for several hours if that was what Gideon wanted to do.

"Whilst I will need the medbay scanners to confirm, I suspect that you are also suffering from malnutrition. You have not been consuming sufficient calories for some months and my cameras suggest that you have lost weight," said Gideon.

"Oh," said Rip, with realisation.

"I was about to inform you of this, but luckily I was able to fix the Waverider," said Gideon.

Sara was giving him a very worried look now. "So basically, you drank a lot and ate nothing? That's pretty stupid, Rip."

"I am painfully aware of that," replied Rip. "But it was quite hard to care about anything with only the prospect of an empty Waverider to look forwards to."

Sara stood and offered Rip a hand up. "Come on, let's get you to the medbay and then you'll be ready to take on the bad guys."

Rip looked at the hand for a moment, still hardly believing that Sara was really stood in front of him. He took her hand and let her pull him to his feet. Then he allowed her to escort him to the medbay, which was surprisingly empty, so perhaps Mick hadn't needed it after all.

He took his seat in the medbay chair and Sara snapped the cuff around his wrist. He froze for a moment, remembering the most recent couple of times that he'd been in this chair.

"What's the matter?" asked Sara.

"Nothing really," said Rip. "Medbay isn't my favourite place."

Sara nodded. "I can understand that."

"Scanning," said Gideon, as the cold, blue light swept across Rip's body.

"What do you have planned for me, Gideon?" asked Rip, looking upwards, once the scan was complete. He was trying hard not to be worried about this but he felt strangely anxious about this procedure.

"I will administer light sedation, and detoxification drugs," said Gideon. "You are, as suspected, suffering from malnutrition, so I will also give you high calorie nutrition through the IV, however you should try to eat better."

"I'll see to it, Gideon," said Sara.

"Thank you, Captain Lance," said Gideon. "Your help is much appreciated."

Rip rolled his eyes. It was never good when Sara and Gideon worked together against him, or perhaps it was for him in this case, but whatever happened it was unlikely he'd enjoy it. He felt the drugs tugging on his awareness.

"Sara," he said, slurring the words as the sedative took hold. "Stay, please? I don't… want to wakeup… alone." Then he was unaware, drifting into deep, welcoming blackness.

* * *

Sara looked up at Gideon. "Is he going to be okay?"

"He is simply sedated," said Gideon. "I will reduce the sedation once treatment is complete. Detoxification can be an unpleasant process and this will keep him comfortable. He could also use the rest."

Rip's skin was flushed and damp with sweat. He must have been feeling quite miserable throughout their break-in at STARLabs, but of course, hadn't said a word.

"So, he said you kept him _mostly_ sane, Gideon," she said. "Tell me about the less sane bit."

"You are already aware of his alcohol abuse," said Gideon. "And that he has not been eating well or sleeping properly. My clinical diagnosis is that he was suffering from depression. I hope that his condition will improve now that the crew is back on the ship."

"Anything else I should know?"

"Medical confidentiality applies unless you, as Captain of this vessel, wish to order me to reveal such details using your override," said Gideon.

"Captain's override, Gideon. I need to know how bad it was," said Sara. She had no guilt about ensuring Rip's future safety, even if that meant prying into his past.

"Eobard Thawne tried to injure Captain Hunter on several occasions. On two occasions he was successful," said Gideon.

"Wait, what did Thawne do?" asked Sara.

"As Captain Hunter stated, Thawne simply picked up the Waverider and shook it, resulting in the Captain being tossed around inside the ship," said Gideon. "The Captain put a warning system in place after his first serious injury to avoid a repeat occurrence."

"But you said he was injured twice," Sara pointed out.

"On the second occasion he ignored the alarms," said Gideon.

"Why did he ignore the alarms?" asked Sara, looking at Rip. He occasionally twitched restlessly.

"He stated that there was no point in prolonging his existence and refused to protect himself," said Gideon. "Luckily I was able to persuade him to go to the medbay."

"How did you manage that?" asked Sara. "It sounds like he'd given up."

"I reminded him that I would be alone if he was not there," said Gideon.

Sara closed her eyes for a moment, just letting that sink in. Rip had considered just letting Thawne kill him rather than continue to live alone, trapped on the Waverider, and the one thing that had pulled him out of it had been the thought that his AI would be unhappy without him.

People often accused Rip of not caring about his crew, and Sara had been one of them, but she knew better after their many months of travelling together. Rip would always rather put himself in danger than someone else. He had a self-sacrifice streak a mile wide, right from when he and Sara had gone to track down Savage's money alone, to his offering to be the one to blow the airlock on their moon adventure. She already knew that he thought of Gideon as a person, so it wasn't surprising that he'd want to spare her from harm too.

"Damn him," said Sara, quietly, looking down at him again. "List his injuries, Gideon."

Gideon did as asked, specifying the dates that the injuries had been received. The list was uncomfortably long. Sara realised that Rip was, quite simply, lucky to be alive. On two separate occasions, Thawne had nearly killed him.

"How did he even get to the medbay?" asked Sara. "He shouldn't have been able to stand."

"Captain Hunter is a very strong individual," said Gideon, apparently not wanting to go into details. Sara detected a note of pride in her tone though.

Rip had clearly been though something of an ordeal, and Sara couldn't blame him for turning to alcohol for solace. She'd possibly have done the same in his position. She'd said as much to him. Equally, it was unsurprising that he was angry with Mick after the arsonist had unthinkingly re-enacted Thawne's torture of him. Sara had been so shocked by the appearance of the miniature Waverider that she hadn't considered what Mick's actions had felt like to the occupant. She did remember Rip's alarmed shout that Mick should stop, and that should have made her realise, but hadn't.

Sara grabbed a chair and sat down beside the bed. She wasn't certain how long she sat there and contemplated everything that Rip had endured alone, but it felt as if at least a couple of hours passed. Jax came into the room carrying a couple of plates with what looked like slices of cake on them.

"Hey, Gideon said you and Rip were in here. What's up with Rip?"

"Alcohol toxicity and malnutrition," said Sara, somewhat sadly. "Basically he survived this by drinking and it made him ill. Gideon's treating him and he'll be fine. That's all you need to know." She wasn't going to give Jax the details of Thawne's games to injure Rip, or tell him that their former Captain had been on the verge of giving up completely. That information was Rip's to tell, and she'd only used her override because she'd needed to know.

"I think he also survived by doing a ton of stress baking," said Jax. "You should see what's in the galley. Here, try this."

He handed her one of the slices of cake and a fork. It appeared to have a tiny, icing cog on top of the white fondant, and a chocolate cream filling in the centre, surrounded by fluffy, vanilla sponge. She was hungry, so she stuck the fork into it and tried a piece. It was unbelievably delicious.

"Oh my god," said Sara, with her mouth full as she tried a second forkful. "This is amazing."

"Yeah, and there are more in the galley," said Jax. "They're definitely not fabricated. Apart from anything, there's a load of flour everywhere and all the mixing bowls were in the dishwasher. Plus it looks like he was experimenting and there's quite a few cakes waiting to go back into the recycler. I think Mick might just have forgiven him for the punch to the jaw, because he found a chocolate fondant with a mirror glaze."

"How do you even know what one of those is?" asked Sara, a little amused.

"Not me, Mick. Apparently, he's a cake connoisseur and has watched every single episode of the Bake Off," said Jax.

"Of course he has," said Sara. "Why should my life get any less weird now?"

Rip stirred.

"Hey, are you waking up?" asked Jax. "We have cake."

Rip's eyes fluttered open. He looked around him with panic for a second and then his eyes settled on first Jax and then Sara. He let out a relieved sigh.

"Are you okay?" asked Sara.

Rip nodded slowly. "For a moment, I thought I'd dreamed that you were all back and I was still alone."

Sara put her hand on his shoulder and gave it a brief squeeze. "We're all still here, and Jax brought you cake. Which since Gideon said you need to eat more, I'd suggest you start with this."

Rip gave her a surprised look and then put a hand to his face. "I didn't clear up the galley. I was so enthusiastic to get the Waverider running again."

Jax handed him the cake and the fork. "Yeah, well, Mick, Ray and Nate are making short work of it for you."

"You stress bake?" asked Sara. "How did we not know this?"

"It's… er… a new thing," said Rip, as he stabbed the fork into the cake. "Gideon suggested that instead of moping about the ship and drinking any alcohol that I found, I should take up a hobby. Incidentally, I owe you a bottle of tequila, Sara."

"You drank the one that was in my quarters?" asked Sara and received a nod in reply. "Well I guess there'll be plenty of tequila in Aruba." She gave a shrug.

"Aruba?" asked Jax.

"Yeah, I thought we might actually give Mick what he wants and have a holiday once we've fixed reality," said Sara.

Jax smiled and nodded enthusiastically. "We could all do with a break."

Rip didn't seem as enthusiastic but he gave a half shrug, as if he couldn't be bothered to argue. Sara was still worried about him. He had nearly eaten an entire slice of cake though, which could only be a good thing at the moment.

"Gideon, can I get out of here yet?" asked Rip, sounding just a little impatient.

"Two more hours, Captain," said Gideon. "If you want to face Mr Thawne at your best then this will help."

"If you'd taken better care of yourself then you wouldn't need this," said Sara, chiding. "You know that we'll always come for you. Don't you?"

Rip looked a little sheepish. "Well, I do now," he said. The cake was finished. "But you'll forgive me for losing faith when I thought that the Legion of Doom had wiped you from the face of existence."

"Yeah, but we're kind of hard to keep down," said Jax.

"That you are," said Rip. "I promise I'll remember that next time I'm in a need of rescuing."

Jax took back the plate and gave Rip a pat on his shoulder. "Okay, I need to get back to the galley and stop Mick from eating everything in sight. Feel better, man."

"Thank you, I already do," said Rip.

Sara smiled as Jax walked away.

"You're not okay, are you?" she asked, and to be honest it was more of a statement than a question.

Rip looked at her for half a second longer than was comfortable before he answered. "Not even remotely. All I want to do is hug you and never let any of you go, but I suspect several of you might object to that, and it would be somewhat impractical. It's very strange given that I've never been one to be openly demonstrative before. And we really don't have time for my insecurities."

"Are you going to manage until this is done?" asked Sara.

"I'll be fine as long as I'm not left alone on the Waverider," said Rip. "Which I doubt is going to happen. We won't have time. And there is one thing about our current plan which I don't think anyone has realised yet."

"Which is?" asked Sara.

"If we go back and change what happened with our past selves so that Doomworld never happens… we won't happen either. We'll cease to exist." Rip's eyes were dark and sad.

Sara sighed. "So this is a one way trip."

Rip nodded solemnly.

"That's a shame, I was looking forwards to Aruba."

"As was I," said Rip. "But perhaps our former selves may still get there if we put this all right."

"We can but hope," said Sara, with a smile.

"And hope springs eternal," replied Rip.

Sara interlaced her fingers with Rip's, and Rip raised her hand to his lips and planted a kiss on it. It was gentle and affectionate, and all she needed to know about how much she meant to him.

Eobard Thawne and his Legion of Doom were going to pay for everything that they'd done to them, for what they'd put Rip and the rest of the team through. They'd pay for the death of every single superhero and vigilante, and Sara wouldn't rest until she'd exhausted every way of getting reality back on track.

"Move over," said Sara.

Rip frowned. "There isn't really anywhere to move to."

"It won't matter," said Sara, "Just shift across a bit. Face towards the door, on your side."

Rip let out another sigh, but did as Sara asked. She climbed onto the chair and arranged herself so that she was pressed up against his back and then she put her arms around him, holding him to her tightly. He stiffened as he realised what she was doing but softened and allowed her to hold him after a moment. It wasn't comfortable for the long term, but for a couple of hours they could manage and Rip would know that he wasn't alone and never would be again.

"I never wanted a team," said Rip, "but I'm very glad I have one and I'm extremely glad that you're part of it, Sara."

"Me too," replied Sara. "Although I feel really sorry for past-me right now, the one who gets to carry on without Doomworld ever happening."

"Why on Earth would you feel sorry for her?" asked Rip.

"Because she may never know what your Genoese sponge tastes like," said Sara.

"It was that good?" asked Rip.

"It was," said Sara. "It might almost be worth breaking time just so that I can tell past-me to get past-you to bake."

"You'd break time for cake?" asked Rip, clearly not serious.

"For that cake, without a moment's hesitation," replied Sara, and she felt Rip begin to shake. At first she thought he was crying or shivering, perhaps a reaction to medication, and then she realised that he was doing in neither. He was laughing uncontrollably and honestly.

Rip Hunter, who rarely even smiled, was lying in her arms laughing. Yes, she felt very sorry for her past self, missing out on cake and laughter. Some things were worth bending reality for, even if it was only temporary.


End file.
